Monday, February 11, 2013

Rumor Has It...

...that tent pole movie star Tom Cruise has signed contracts to sell his long-time New York City pied-a-terre for three million clams.

According the well-connected folks at The Real Deal, Mister Cruise's Big Apple crib spans 2,200 square feet on the 10th floor spread of the American Felt Building in the East Village and features two bedrooms plus a state-of-the-art fitness room that's convertible to a third bedroom. The apartment was not on the open market so no listing photos or details exist online.

Property records indicate the L.A.-based Mister Cruise purchased the two-unit combo condo apartment in 1985, after his star-making role in Risky Business, and he reportedly shared the apartment over the years with a slew of wives (Mimi Rogers, Nicole Kidman, Katie Holmes) and gal pals (Rebecca de Mornay and Cher). Property records also reveal Other notable residents of the American Felt Building include writer/Twitter fiend Brett Easton Ellis and Fabrizio Moretti, the Brazilian-born drummer for the Strokes and the current man-friend former Saturday Night Live cast member and Oscar-nominated screenwriter Kristen Wiig (Bridesmaids).

The Real Deal went on to report that Mister Cruise also owns a substantial estate in Beverly Hills, CA, plus an "8,100-square-foot brownstone at 42 West 12th Street in Manhattan." We can confirm that Mister Cruise owns a Beverly Hills estate that he bought in April 2007 for $30,500,000 as well as a 200-plus acre ranch in Telluride (CO) but we've never been able to directly connect Mister Cruise to the above addressed townhouse that property records show was last purchased in April 2009 for $15,075,000. Indeed, a deep dive down into and a good long roll around various property record data bases and building permits accessible on the internets suggest to Your Mama that the Greenwich Village townhouse in question may not be owned by Mister Cruise but rather by a prominent and very rich real estate financier and developer. Whomever the owner may be secured permits to put a hot tub on the roof in 2011.

Ever since Katie Holmes unceremoniously dumped Mister Cruise last year there have been all manner of reports by real estate gossips around the globe that he's looking to buy an East Coast estate in order to have a home base near his youngest off-spring, Suri. In all honestly, Your Mama does not have any specific intel on any property he may have toured but—so the stories go—Mister Cruise has peeped properties in some of the more expensive zip codes in some of the more upscale and uppity suburbs that surround New York City including Westchester County (NY), Sneden's Landing (NY) and—natch—Greenwich (CT).

Interestingly enough, this business about Mister Cruise selling off his long-time digs at the American Felt Building comes quick on the heels of some fascinating—but totally unconfirmed—real estate scuttlebutt Your Mama heard late last week from a previously reliable informant—let's call him Dennis Dishesrealestatedirt—who says he knows people who have whispered to him that it's Mister Cruise who is behind the "architecturally quiet," not quite complete and secrecy shrouded Annabelle Selldorf-designed project that's located a big farther west on West 12th Street than the brownstone townhouse often reported to belong to Mister Cruise. Rumor and gossip, children, just some good ol' fashioned celebrity real estate rumor and property gossip.

Momma, you missed the most interesting detail: it is being reported that diminutive Tom "Thumb" Cruise had the ceilings in the loft-style unit LOWERED. The poor little guy must have felt short in there . . . .